It’s almost as if doing something wrong doesn’t count as wrongdoing unless you get caught red-handed. Awkward moments feel incomplete without witnesses.
Before Lu Xingyan and Shen Xingruo could react, there was a sudden knocking at the door, “It’s me.”
— Pei Yue’s voice.
A phrase flashed through Lu Xingyan’s mind, “Misfortunes never come singly, but come in pairs, just as blessings come in pairs,” he wasn’t sure if it was appropriate, but amidst the confusion in his mind, he silently felt somewhat cultured.
The door was unlocked, and with Pei Yue’s greeting, she intended to push the door open.
The faint sound of the door lock twisting came to their ears, while the dripping sound of Vitasoy milk continued.
In that moment, all their senses seemed magnified tenfold, a hundredfold.
Shen Xingruo’s head felt a bit numb, and her chin was sore from being poked.
For a brief moment, her mind went blank for two or three seconds. Suddenly coming to her senses, she suppressed her discomfort, pressing down on Lu Xingyan’s thigh as she got up.
She didn’t care about urgency, directly wiping the milk stains from her lips onto Lu Xingyan’s T-shirt, then pulling the air conditioner quilt from Lu Xingyan’s bed, covering his lower body directly.
— At the moment of covering, Pei Yue came in with two cups of milk.
Shen Xingruo remained composed, walking up to Pei Yue, even raising the corners of her lips, and taking the two cups of milk from Pei Yue’s hands.
“Thank you, Auntie Pei.”
Her voice was normal too.
Lu Xingyan was still bewildered.
Shen Xingruo completed this set of quilt-covering actions with a difficulty level of 88 as smoothly as flowing water, precisely controlled within seconds before his mother entered the room.
What’s more remarkable was that immediately after this set of high-difficulty movements, she seamlessly transitioned into a set of model student performances with a difficulty level of 99, her face neither blushing nor skipping a beat, her smile sweet yet poised, maintaining closeness without losing politeness, it could be said there were no flaws.
Pei Yue entered the room, feeling that something was not quite right, but she couldn’t pinpoint exactly what it was.
She glanced around, smiling and exchanging a few words with Shen Xingruo, then her expression changed in a second, warning Lu Xingyan to listen to Shen Xingruo’s tutoring properly.
As she was about to turn and leave, she suddenly paused, “Lu Xingyan, what are you covering yourself with?”
Shen Xingruo spoke for him, “He said he’s cold.”
Pei Yue looked Lu Xingyan up and down, “Wearing short sleeves on the upper body and covering with a quilt on the lower body, what are you playing at? If you’re cold, why don’t you wear a coat?”
Shen, acting as his spokesperson, continued, “He said his legs are cold.”
Pei Yue seemed to understand something in an instant, she stepped forward and pinched Lu Xingyan’s ear, “Are you bothering Ruoru? Don’t mess around with me. Let me tell you, focus on your tutoring. Don’t give me any trouble!”
After the warning, she turned to Shen Xingruo and said, “Ruoru, if he causes any more trouble, just ignore him and go back to your room to sleep. His level is just like that anyway, you kindly tutor him, but he doesn’t have any motivation!”
Shen Xingruo stood quietly there, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, looking very obedient and aggrieved.
Lu Xingyan wanted to say something to defend himself, but before he could speak, he was glared at by Pei Yue.
Two minutes later, Shen Xingruo escorted Pei Yue out.
Watching Pei Yue disappear around the corner of the stairs, Shen Xingruo gently closed the door and returned to the room.
There was a faint, sweet smell of milk in the room.
Once Lu Xingyan saw Pei Yue leave, he immediately lifted the air conditioner quilt from the bed, glanced down, and then let out a sigh.
His pants were damp in the middle, visibly swollen, with a puddle of creamy Vitasoy milk on the floor.
If Pei Yue had walked in on this scene just now, with Shen Xingruo’s head still resting on his lap, Lu Xingyan didn’t know whether his mother would have banished them forever or married them off on the spot.
Shen Xingruo couldn’t help but recall the scene just now. She discreetly shifted her gaze, standing a distance away, not approaching.
Lu Xingyan got up and walked to the wardrobe, grabbing clothes as if nothing had happened, casually asking, “What were you doing just now? I hadn’t even reacted yet and you’ve already spilled milk all over me.”
Shen Xingruo replied, “I didn’t blame you. Yet you’re trying to shift the blame onto me.”
Lu Xingyan noticed an unopened khaki hoodie in his wardrobe, exactly like the one Shen Xingruo was wearing. It seemed to be a solid color without any patterns, completely contrary to his style, so he had never worn it.
He picked up the hoodie and said, “Blame me? What do I have to blame for? I was just minding my own business, doing my homework diligently, while it was you causing trouble.”
Before Shen Xingruo could speak, he shook the new clothes he had just taken out, “Hey, I’m going to change clothes, turn around.”
Shen Xingruo didn’t move.
He raised an eyebrow, and pinched the corner of his clothes as if he were going to pull them up, “Hey, I’m going to take them off.”
This time, Shen Xingruo reacted quickly, immediately turning around and walking to the desk.
Lu Xingyan teased her intentionally, seeing her serious expression, he smirked, took the clothes, and went to the bathroom.
By the time Lu Xingyan changed clothes, Shen Xingruo had already tidied up the mess under the desk.
They sat back down.
Shen Xingruo felt something was off, looked up and down at Lu Xingyan’s clothes, and then suddenly said, “Your clothes are the same as mine.”
Lu Xingyan paused his writing, raising an eyebrow.
Shen Xingruo met his gaze and asked, “Why are you wearing the same clothes as me?”
“Why can’t I wear what I bought with my money?” Lu Xingyan looked at her calmly, “I just happened to see a piece of clothing that’s the same as yours. I thought of wearing it to show respect for you. Do you think I’m intentionally trying to match outfits with you?”
Shen Xingruo didn’t respond, tapping the desk with a pen expressionlessly, “Write your answers.”
Lu Xingyan leaned back in his chair and gestured with two fingers from his brow towards her lazily.
Then he casually said, “Yes, teacher Shen.”
Shen Xingruo gave him five minutes. Seeing him writing and drawing on the scratch paper quite seriously, she asked, “How far have you gotten?”
“Didn’t you ask me to write the first question?” Lu Xingyan replied.
Shen Xingruo leaned forward slightly, took the test paper from Lu Xingyan’s desk, and glanced at it, “The first question is just about subsets. Why did you write on two sheets of scratch paper? And it’s a multiple-choice question, even a pig would have a one-in-four chance of getting it right.”
Lu Xingyan: “Hey, can you speak without insulting people like that?”
Shen Xingruo: “You can’t even score 400 points and yet you’re so sensitive.”
Shen Xingruo glanced at him, snatched the test paper, and started explaining the first question. The initial questions were simple, so she hadn’t written anything down.
Lu Xingyan wasn’t hopeless either; he listened to her explanations and understood.
When it came to geometry questions, Shen Xingruo took the scratch paper and patiently drew diagrams for him.
“This is a cylinder, with o1o2 as the center points, connect them like this…”
“The question mentions a section passing through the line o1o2, meaning the cylinder is cut in half from the center… Do you understand what ‘cut in half’ means?”
She had a hint of the scent of green grass shower gel on her, with a slightly sweet aroma.
As Lu Xingyan listened to her explanation and saw her drawings, he inexplicably found her cute, feeling a bit distracted, and not paying attention to what she was saying.
When she asked if he understood, he simply shook his head.
Shen Xingruo paused, turning to him seriously, “Are you a pig?”
Lu Xingyan: “…”
Cuteness lasted only for three seconds.
Shen Xingruo was losing her patience; she picked up the Vitasoy milk again and gestured, “This is a cylinder. The cross-section obtained by connecting the centers of the upper and lower faces with a straight line is what we call a horizontal section.”
Lu Xingyan earnestly replied, “But when you cut it open, it’s mostly empty inside. The milk got spilled all over me. If you insist on calling it a surface, it’s more like a ‘u’ shape.”
Shen Xingruo: “…”
“Imagine it as a solid.”
“Do you lack even this basic imagination? How did you score over 300 points?”
Shen Xingruo’s patience was nearing its end.
Lu Xingyan felt that if he pushed it further, Shen Xingruo would pick up a book and beat him.
He quickly applied the brakes, “Okay, okay, stop scolding me. You’ve confused me enough already.”
“Your brain was already confused to begin with.”
Lu Xingyan didn’t want to argue with her, raising his hands in surrender, “Alright, I’ll do it by myself first. I’ll ask you if I don’t understand, okay?”
Shen Xingruo dropped the test paper, her temples pounding.
After a few minutes of silence, seeing Lu Xingyan focusing on the questions, she instructed, “You write first, I’ll go downstairs to bring the cups for the milk.”
“They’re just plastic gloves. Why do you always think of me in such a dirty way? It’s these weird shops nowadays, intentionally making them look like that to attract attention. I’m a decent person, advocating the Five Virtues and Four Beauties, loving to study, having a positive attitude, and remaining pure. How could I ever use these?”
The words “remain pure” exploded in the room, plunging it into silence.
Shen Xingruo couldn’t help but push him back with her hand over his mouth, “Shut up.”
Shen Xingruo didn’t stay in Lu Xingyan’s room any longer. She only instructed him to finish the test on his own and then ruthlessly declared the end of tonight’s tutoring session, without even eating the chicken wings.
Lu Xingyan leaned back in his chair, ran his hand through his hair, then pulled out his phone, found the order for the plastic gloves, and left a bad review.
He sternly criticized the restaurant, accusing them of filling their minds with trash and not taking their delivery seriously. He warned them that if they continued like this, they would go out of business sooner or later.
That night, Lu Xingyan went to bed early.
He wondered if he would have any good dreams, but he ended up sleeping until nine in the morning without dreaming about anything.
On the other hand, after returning to her room last night, Shen Xingruo thought that Lu Xingyan’s almost non-existent foundation couldn’t handle anything too advanced right away. So, she dug out her notebook from her first year of high school and spent until three in the morning editing it.
She was someone who enjoyed sleeping in, but she always felt the need to be polite when staying at Lu’s house, so she always woke up early. However, after spending so much time at Lu’s house, she gradually becomes less restrained.
She slept until noon without waking up.
Lunchtime was approaching, and Pei Yue was puzzled, “You’re awake, why hasn’t Ruoruo gotten up yet? Doesn’t she usually wake up early?”
“How would I know? Maybe she’s dreaming.”
Lu Xingyan, the experienced one, casually replied.
Pei Yue raised her chin slightly, gesturing towards him, “Go upstairs and wake Ruoruo up for lunch.”
Lu Xingyan lazily murmured in agreement, finished a game, then abandoned the game console and got up to go upstairs.
Standing at Shen Xingruo’s door, Lu Xingyan knocked a few times and called her name.
There was no response.
Lu Xingyan casually turned the doorknob and suddenly realized that Shen Xingruo hadn’t locked the door.
He cleared his throat and raised his voice, “Shen Xingruo, Shen Xingruo? If you don’t respond, I’m coming in.”
Still, there was no sound.
So, Lu Xingyan entered the room without hesitation.
Shen Xingruo was still curled up in her blanket, sleeping on her side in a sleeveless nightgown.
Lu Xingyan stood by the bedside, avoiding her gaze, and called her name a couple more times.
Shen Xingruo turned over, furrowing her brows slightly.
She hadn’t tied her hair up when she went to bed, so there were many stray strands on her face as she turned over. Her lips were a pale pink color, and her long eyelashes curled upwards like little fans.
Lu Xingyan looked at her for a moment, then leaned in closer to observe, even reaching out to brush her eyelashes.
Shen Xingruo seemed to sense something, furrowing her brows again and murmuring something.
Lu Xingyan instinctively didn’t make a sound as he helped move her hair away from her face and tucked it behind her ear.
Looking at her like this, she seemed much cuter than usual, with her frequent sarcastic remarks.
Shen Xingruo didn’t like being touched by others; whenever someone touched her, she would move. Lu Xingyan helped her fix her hair, and she couldn’t help but roll over, shifting from side to side. Though her position remained unchanged, one of her straps fell.
Seeing this, Lu Xingyan’s breath hitched.
He didn’t know where to put his hands or feet.
He felt it wasn’t right and was considering whether to help adjust her strap.
Just as he was about to reach out, hesitating, Shen Xingruo’s eyelashes trembled, and she suddenly opened her eyes.
Both of them were caught off guard as their eyes met.
Three seconds of silence passed before Shen Xingruo asked, “Virgin, what are you doing in my room?”